Monday, May 19, 2014

Is Japan Plotting A More Militaristic Future While Not Confronting Its Past?

Prime Minister Abe visits Yasukuni Shrine

Nearly 70
years after the end of World War II, Germany is a fully
fledged player in Europe and the world. Its Nazi past is not forgotten,
but is no longer an issue. By contrast, Japan is a marginal player in
Asia and nearly invisible on the world stage beyond its quality automobiles and electronic goods, and its militaristic past,
let alone its inability to seriously confront its crimes against
humanity during the war, remains very much an issue. For this reason
alone, any effort on the part of the Tokyo government to move away from
Japan's postwar pacifism should be greeted with concern.

And
concerned we should be about the recommendation of an advisory panel
appointed by the government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to junk Japan's
war-renouncing Constitution and expand the role of its military, the
Self-Defense Forces, which has been limited to protecting Japan's own
territory and taking on minor roles in global peacekeeping
missions.

Abe's
initiative ostensibly is to allow Japan to form military alliances with
other democratic nations in addition to the U.S. and allow its forces to come
to the aid of allied nations under attack; say, to shoot down a North
Korean missile aimed at the U.S., when Japan itself is not at risk. This is something that its Constitution, which was drafted by U.S. occupation
forces after the war, expressly forbids.

(Japan's no-nukes policy would remain unchanged. Public opposition to nuclearization of its military is overwhelming, although its governments have routinely looked the other way when U.S. ships and submarines with nuclear weapons have entered its ports.)

Abe's initiative comes
at a time when powerful China has grown increasingly assertive while the
pathetic Pyongyang regime remains reliably bellicose. Yet polls show broad
opposition in Japan to Abe's initiative because of a fear that the nationalistic prime
minister would use the changes to dismantle the Constitution and its
unambiguous rejection of
war.

Abe
calls the doctrine underlying the proposed changes "proactive pacifism"
and asserts that a stronger military would help ensure peace.

"By increasing our deterrence,
our country will be able to avoid becoming caught up in war," he says.

* * * * *

There is no more controversial symbol of Japan's militaristic past than Yasukuni Shrine.

Over
1,000 convicted Japanese war criminals, including 14 so-called Class A
war criminals who were executed after trial -- the civilian leaders,
generals and admirals most responsible for the systematic massacre of
tens of millions of civilians, use of rape and chemical and biological
warfare, and brutalities against POWs -- are enshrined in the
magnificent Shinto shrine in Tokyo's Chiyoda ward.

The shrine includes a
museum that seeks to justify Japan's invasions of its neighbors.

Prime
Minister Abe, like some of his more recent predecessors, has made it a
point to visit Yasakuni although these visits are sure to cause offense
in China, South Korea and other nations who suffered under the Japanese
fist. His last visit was in December, although he sent "ritual offerings" to the shrine last month just before President Obama's three-day visit,
a seemingly in-your-face gesture that "disappointed" the U.S. State
Department and bolstered the view that Abe is an historical revisionist who believes the convictions of Japan's wartime leaders were merely "victors' justice."

* * * * *

I have more than a passing acquaintance with Japan. With Tokyo as my
base, I traveled the country in the early 1970s. I made many friends and
became deeply enamored of Japanese architecture, art, drama and
cuisine, as well as their love of American jazz.

But
I also came to understand that the Japanese are literally and
figuratively insular and xenophobia is a national trait. They also are
deeply racist. These traits go a long way toward explaining why
Japan rose from the ashes of World War II to become an economic colossus
but has not been able to shake off its imperialist past and become a
major player on the global political stage.

Although it
is long past time for Japan to grow its own military capability and play
a larger security role, although not to the extent that Abe now advocates, the Japanese themselves recognize that there is
something in their national character that has prevented them from
accepting and taking responsibility for their past. And that the prospect of a
militarist future is deeply worrisome.

Japanese
textbooks still paper over the country's barbarous wartime conduct.
Pearl Harbor notwithstanding, many Japanese believe that their country
was not the aggressor and atrocities like the Rape of Nangking never
happened. According to opinion polls, about a third
of all Japanese rationalize the visits of prime ministers to Yasukuni to save face because of
condemnations from China and South Korea. Ah, yes, saving
face.

These sentiments make the prospect of a remilitarized Japan
a frightening prospect to Japanese who believe that despite the outward
appearance of a sophisticated society moving with alacrity into the
21st century, a middle course between pacifism and militarism is not
possible. I have to agree.

* * * * *

Japan is at a crossroads. Its population is aging and its birth rate
continues to drop. There will literally not be enough people to run
Japan's factories and institutions in a few decades, while its
immigration policies make it extremely difficult for non-Japanese to
become citizens, let alone enter the workforce.

I
moonlighted at a newspaper in Tokyo where my boss was a talented man
whose father was Japanese and mother Chinese. Although he was easily the
brightest star in the newsroom, because of his mixed parentage he had
no chance of being promoted above the lower middle-management position
he had held for years and would have until he retired. As a gaijin (foreigner), I stood no chance of getting a decent job, and still would have no chance today.

No, not all Japanese are racist xenophobes. My friends certainly
weren't, and as painful as the subject was, they acknowledged the truth
about Japan and World War II and its inability to come to terms with its
past. Some had spent time in Europe and the U.S. and several attended
American universities. Coming home, shaking off the Western ways that
had loved and accepting their parents' wishes that they accept the old
ways was painful to watch.

My landlady, Mrs. Mioshi, was one of
the first Japanese women to attend Oxford University in England. We
became good friends, and one evening after farewell dinner with she and
her husband in their upstairs apartment, she said that she wanted to
show me something before I flew home.

She explained that she had
brought back a lovely Wedgewood china dinner service from England before
the war and had buried it deep in the back yard of their Tokyo home
early in 1945 when the U.S. advance up the Pacific enabled its B-29
bombers to reach Tokyo.

The Mioshis lived out the closing months
of the war with relatives in the country. They returned after the
surrender to find Roppongi, their neighborhood, decimated from
firebombings.

Mrs. Mioshi told this story as she opened the doors to a cupboard and pulled out a dinner plate.

"It
was a lovely ivory white," she explained as she handed the plate to me.
"But you can see what the intense heat of the firebombings did."

Indeed. The plate had turned an otherwordly cobalt blue, as had the rest of the dinner service.

"I
forgive the Americans for what they had to do," Mrs. Mioshi said in her
tiny voice. Japanese often look down when they address gaijin, but she looked me right in the eye.

"It is just that we will never be able to confront our past, let alone forgive ourselves for it."

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About Me

Shaun Mullen was born to blog. It just took a few years for the medium to catch up to the messenger. Over a long career with newspapers, this award-winning editor and reporter covered the Vietnam War, O.J. Simpson trials, Clinton impeachment circus and coming of Osama bin Laden, among many other big stories. Mullen was a five-time Pulitzer Prize nominee and has covered 12 presidential campaigns. He is the author of "The Bottom of the Fox: A True Story of Love, Devotion & Cold-Blooded Murder" (2010) and "There's A House In The Land: A Tale of the 1970s" (2014). Both books are available for sale online in trade paperback and Kindle editions. Much of Mullen's work is archived and can be accessed online in the Shaun D. Mullen Journalism Papers in Special Collections at the University of Delaware Library.